Focus Point - U.S. Largesse

Commentary by Pete du Pont

October 10, 2001

I'm Pete du Pont with the National Center for Policy Analysis. Amazingly, the head of the Taliban government said the U.S. didn't have the guts to attack his country. First, we aren't going to attack his country -- we're going to attack terrorists in his country.

But another reason we're not going to carpet bomb Afghanistan or invade in force is that it doesn't serve our objectives.

We want the terrorists out, and help for the Afghan people in. The U.S. is the largest source of humanitarian foreign aid to Afghanistan -- the very country that protects and hides Osama Bin Laden. Just weeks after the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole -- which Bin Laden organized -- the Clinton Administration raised the amount of Afghan aid to over $100 million.

We're perfectly capable of making the distinction between aid for civilians who are desperate in a devastated country, and evil men whose idea of religion is to murder the innocent. Americans have always been generous to those in need. To those who are evil, it's a different matter.

Those are my ideas, and at the NCPA we know ideas can change the world. I'm Pete du Pont. Next time, war and the economy.